I am not a woman who
“Handles the servants well,”
But I do not long for the strange liberty,
Or even the hotly whispered possibility,
Of leaving West Amman.

“Never look back,” Omar said,
But what if looking forward is not an option either?
The only thing you see there
Is the dust beneath your feet.

Anyway, Omar, you still married some idiot:
Some woman who is like a wormhole
Rotating slowly in all dimensions,
Like a blind spider in a web,
Hatching.

Why should I listen to you?

Here I have my shops and tea at dusk.
I have tried one hundred kinds of firming cream,
One hundred pairs of iron shoes,
One hundred loaves of iron bread.

I have known pain as magnificent as yours.

I just want a little bit of peace, Omar,
Some music and hair grease, Omar.
Some boy who catches my eye
In a car on the bridge in purring Ramadan traffic
With no desire to know how to unscrew these bolts
And take me apart.

Tags: alina zaria, poetry